Managing Under Pressure: Industrial Relations in Local Government ~ Paperback ~ Martin Laffin

Recent changes in public service industrial relations have created major public policy problems. This book introduces the main issues and theoretical perspectives of industrial relations in local government and the public services more generally. The problems of industrial relations are illustrated by case studies of a Thatcherite Conservative and a left-wing Labour Council in Britain. The author pays particular attention to the problems of sustaining management authority roles in elected public agencies. The series is designed to provide up-to-date comprehensive and authorative analyses of public policy and politics in practice and focuses on contemporary Britain. It embraces not only local and central government activity, but also central-local relations, public-sector/private-sector relations and the role of non-governmental agencies.Table of ContentsIndustrial relations in local government - pluralism, social action and the Marxist approaches, corporatism, fiscal crisis; management under pressure - the structure of local authority industrial relations, the central-local government relationship, the negotiability of change under the fiscal crisis; unions under pressure; radical Conservatism and the unions - the departure of the Chief Executive, the redundancy dispute, the first administration and privatization, housing, the building society dispute; radical Labourism and the unions - the low pay issue, decentralization, the strike, the rate-capping crisis; crises of managerial authority - coping with environmental pressures, sustaining the negotiability of change, differentiating management roles and responsibilities; the unions and the management of discontent - responding to change, relating to management, managing discontent; managing under pressure - the negotiation of change - policy versus trust, from fragmented management to differentiated management, reclaiming the rights of management?